Category: Talks SOPhiA

Gabriele Scotto University of Turin Standard decision theory and rational choice theory are well-developed tools that can help an agent in his or her everyday decisions. People can use decision theory in ordinary situations, such as buying a basket of bananas or oranges or selling an old car for a new one. Nevertheless, some scholars…

Kevin Walkner University of Vienna With the emergence of formal methods in philosophy, the traditional study of definitions was largely replaced by a modern, mathematical theory of definitions. In this context, conditions under which the extension of a formal theory and its signature by a constant and a formula counts as a definitional theory extension…

Priyanka Pragati Indian Institute of Technology Kanpur, India Most of us tend to believe that we know certain moral propositions are true. Torturing for fun could be one such example. Such moral propositions can qualify as moral knowledge as they make the case of justified true beliefs. But does this give us the same epistemic…

Guillaume Andrieux University of Glasgow Epistemic norms of action have received increased philosophical attention in recent years. Singer and Aronowitz (2021) argue through a series of cases that we can have epistemic reasons to act in many ways, including to eat a sandwich. Similarly, Flores and Woodard (2023) argue that there are epistemic norms on…

Myungjun Kim Florida State University Given the recent hype around large language machines (LLMs), there are surprisingly few principled approaches to the meaning of LLM outputs. I explore the implications of one of the rare principled approaches, the Williamson-Cappelen-Dever (“W-C-D”) theory of AI metasemantics. I argue that assuming the W-C-D theory, LLM outputs currently do…

Jakub Kańtoch Jagiellonian University, Doctoral School in the Humanities In his recent book M. Boyle (2024) argues against common approaches to the problem of transparency of self-knowledge. The problem of transparency concerns an explanation of a curious mental phenomenon: as G. Evans (1982) observes, answers to questions about our world-directed mental states (like beliefs) are…

Maren Bräutigam University of Cologne In this paper, I discuss the ambiguity problem which befalls the heterodox view on the qualitative identity/difference of similar particles, such as two electrons. According to the heterodox view, similar particles are (almost always) qualitatively distinct, so that Leibniz’s Principle of the Identity of Indiscernibles is valid (this view contrasts…

Kamil Furman Jagiellonian University Relational Quantum Mechanics (RQM) is an interpretation of quantum theory developed recently by Carlo Rovelli (Rovelli 1996, 2018, 2022). Compared to other interpretations, it does not change the formalism of the theory or introduce ad hoc rules, but tries to change the ontology by reinterpreting the concepts that make up the…

Daian Bica Heinrich-Heine-Universität In the current talk, I shall compare two recent approaches to the role of the Best System Analysis’s (in short, BSA) laws in the scientific practice. The first view is Massimi’s perspectival interpretation of the BSA, i.e., laws/lawhood are relative to the epistemic needs of scientific communities occupying various perspectives throughout history…

Seoyeon Park University of Pittsburgh Models are a useful instrument in science, enabling us to explain the behavior of complex systems. However, the explanatory power of models is puzzling given that models typically contain idealizations, false assumptions about real-world systems. My goal is to clarify the role of models in scientific knowledge. I claim that…